Bunnies & Burrows. A game that was always on the periphery of my awareness of the great ecosystem of RPGs. I'd heard the name around, of course, mostly in context of the GURPS setting book that released when I was in high school. Coming into the hobby as I did in 1986, I had sort of missed the original first and second editions of the game. I was aware that it was Watership Down the RPG in many ways, and like many children of the 80s I had been traumatized by that film growing up. It wouldn't come to the fore of my attention until I met one of the original authors, who has since become a dear friend.
Now, here's the rub, for me. I've played anthropomorphic animals in RPGs. I loved Palladium's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness. I'd played Gamma World characters that would certainly qualify. Caitians in Star Trek. Dog Boys in Rifts. But I'd not actually played... you know... and animal. Like, without human characteristics. The concept sort of boggled my brain. I was used to playing RPGs that focused around struggles that were at their core more rooted to our bipedal experience, I guess. Maybe it's more than that- I love The Transformers, and have contemplated running games involving them. But then I start thinking too hard about the psychology of living machines and why, precisely, a created species has gendered characters like Alita-1 and Arcee.
So, I'll admit going into this that I was more than a bit confused about B&B even after I met and gamed with Dennis (Dr. B. Dennis Sustare, the aforementioned member of the duo who created the game.) But Dennis also introduced me to something else - North Texas RPG Con. This convention was like Gary Con South. You couldn't throw a rock without hitting someone who had worked in the RPG industry in the 70s and 80s. It was amazing to me to be surrounded by the folks who had created my hobby. And at that convention, every year, Dennis runs B&B. And at that convention, every year, the tables are packed full of players and the alternate list is as long as your arm. So... I was obviously missing something.
During the development of Bunnies & Burrows Third Edition, myself and our gaming club were privileged to participate in play testing some of the material with Dennis, we even used B&B for one of our Extra Life live-streams for charity. I finally got to sit down and play the game. Experience the genre rather than just read about it. I have to say- it was eye-opening.
You can quite literally do only what an animal can do, physically. Carrying is usually done with your mouth. Manipulating things can only be done if it could be done with paws. Even some mental abilities are limited- like counting past low single digits. At first these limitations really seemed like they would kill the game for me. Even though I pride myself on games where I absolutely do not optimize character picks. I just couldn't wrap my head 'round the game, until I played. And then I started to understand it's a serious roleplaying challenge to step into a character that isn't just a human with pointy ears, or a tail, but something with an entirely different physical and mental existence. This was an entirely unique roleplaying experience that required a much higher degree of thought and distancing the character from myself than I'd ever done before.
So, with all that in mind, let's create a character for the first edition of Bunnies & Burrows that I played - the current Third Edition.
Character Creation
There are eight genetic Traits for a player character in B&B. They are Strength, Speed, Intelligence, Agility, Constitution, Mysticism, Smell, and Charisma. These are determined by rolling 3d6 for each of them. So here we go:
- Strength: 9
- Speed: 11
- Intelligence: 9
- Agility: 12
- Constitution: 10
- Mysticism: 11
- Smell: 6
- Charisma: 13
We can now add one point to three scores, or two points to one score. There is a profession for each Trait, and it looks like we're not going to be an Herbalist, since our associated Trait, Smell, is not great. Charisma is 13, that's associated with Storyteller. So let's go with that. We'll bump Smell, Intelligence, and Charisma. Since Charisma has a +1 modifier for being 13 or over, we speak an extra language. I'm going to take Chatter, so that our PC can speak with Squirrels.
As a Storyteller, our rabbit will have some special abilities. We can Encourage, and in the future, we can Confuse and Enthrall. This is an neat mechanic of B&B, which, on its face, is sort of based on the old D&D engine. But it does something quite neat. As opposed to old school D&D where your ability score gives you a modifier, and that's that, the modifier in B&B becomes the Trait Level. And as characters advance, they can add directly to that level. For example, our PC's Charisma is 14, which gives an initial modifier of +1. Had it been an 18, the modifer would have been +3, giving us immediate access to Confuse. But as it is, we will have to play long enough to advance Charisma twice, which brings the Trait Level, the effective modifier, up to +3.
Being a Storyteller is an important role for a rabbit, without written language, knowledge, legends, and moral tales can only be related by the telling of stories, what we would call oral traditions.
Here's the part where we would normally equip the character - except this is Bunnies & Burrows, and our PC isn't exactly going to need a pack, armor, or a 10' pole. The only extensive section on what might be considered items is the wonderful selection of herbs available to the animal denizens of the game. And there are quite a few, enough to make for very interesting applications and herb-inspired adventures. But after calculating Hit Points (8) this rabbit is ready to play, game mechanics-wise.
The Character
As Thornpaw spoke, the other rabbits gradually stopped their bickering and listened. Every word, every detail was just as the tale had been told, in fact the tone and delivery was so close to their storyteller's style and cadence more than a couple mouths hung open in surprise. When Thornpaw was finished weaving the tale, he was surprised to find all eyes were steady on him, a new respect on most faces around the circle. From that day forward Thornpaw had his place among the other rabbits - he was the new Storyteller.
My Thoughts
This extends to GMing B&B. There's advice on how to describe things to players in a bunny-centric way. Rabbits have no frame of reference to comprehend things asw humans would. No sense of mechanical devices, or the purposes of items or tools. So this game doesn't just ask for a change of paradigm in players, it asks for the GM to filter everything that happens through that paradigm. This is more than just learning new names for these, like the dinosaurs in Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, this is learning how mysterious and alien things we interact with every day are to creatures who do not have our ability to comprehend the complex.
As I said, this game is way out of my wheelhouse, yet I see so many lining up to play it, and now I finally get the appeal. This is unlike any other RPG I've played. I've been a Dralasite, a Vampire, a Wookiee, an Andorian, a Dwarf... but all those characters are relatable to humans. This is the first game I've played that strays so far from that it strains my ability to get into the headspace of my character. For that alone, it is worth a read. The fact that it was written by two doctors of biological sciences and contains a vast amount of thought from an ecological point of view makes it even more interesting.
Check this out, from Frog God Games.
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